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Dan Webster can be reached at (509) 459-5483 or by e-mail at [email protected].
Movies made for children are, for the most part, mini-morality tales.
This isn't exactly news. Long before the Grimm Brothers began collecting folk stories, parents tried to teach their children lessons through the use of fables, parables and even nursery rhymes grounded largely in everyday experience.
Walt Disney Studios has made a specialty of such moralizing, especially in animated films. A good example is "Lilo & Stitch," which is available this week for home viewing (see capsule review below).
The key to the genre is how well the filmmaker is able to make a movie that is both entertaining and educational. "Lilo & Stitch," in particular, shows how this is typically done.
Call it the sidekick syndrome.
"Lilo & Stitch" is a coming-of-age story in which a young Hawaiian girl (Lilo) learns the value of family ties through forming a friendship with a genetically mutated alien creature (Stitch). What makes the movie even richer is that the creature itself learns a lesson, namely that its programming doesn't eliminate the ability to make personal choices.
Consider Disney's 1992 version of "Aladdin," part of the moral- minded Arabian Nights stories. The title character, in Disney's view a street rat, learns a lesson about character with the help of a genie (voice by Robin Williams) doomed to live in a magical lamp.
Disney doesn't have a monopoly on such films. In 1999, Warner Brothers distributed "The Iron Giant," a visually impressive...